THE LATE MR. AUSTIN DOBSON.
[To THE EDITOR or TEE " SPECTATOR.”]
SIR, —There is no really complete edition of the poetry of Austin Dobson. Now that, alas! we shall get no more of his almost faultless verses, may we hope that his literary executors will issue a final collection of all that ho thought worthy of pre- serving in the last " collected edition," together with such of his later poems as have appeared in periodicals or in such books as A Bookman's Budget (1917)? Those beautiful lines of Dobson's " For a closing page " (see p. 193 of the Budget) would fittingly close any such collection as I hope to see published. Can you find room for the two verses that end the poem?—
"Blithe to the close, and still Tendering ever, Both for the good and ill, Thanks to the Giver.
So, the' the script is slow, Blurred tho' the line is, Let the poor record go, Forward to finis."
There have been many greater poets than Austin Dobson, but for dainty technique, charm, freshness, and a certain sprightly humour—often dashed with exquisite tenderness—ho has not had an equal in our time. His curiosa felicitas of diction was quite Horatian. Indeed, he is one of the few, the very few, who might have translated the "Odes," had he been so minded. Compare his rendering of the Latin poet's " 0 ions Bandusiae " with any other published rendering of the same inimitable original, and my contention will seem anything but far-fetched.
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